Bea

home again, home again, jiggity jig

Things I love about being back in our home, and about it being summer:

1. The sound of the kids a few doors down as they jump into their pool
2. Seeing my neighbours in the local village, and feeling like I belong
3. The blue BLUE sky above the green GREEN trees that surround our small patch of land*
4. Our deck, and the way it captures the sun
5. The 10 minute walk to the beach
6. Our fantastic neighbours
7. Bird song, all day long
8. A glass of wine on the deck at the end of the day

 

* I said small. As in, I'm sitting on the deck just 3 feet from the door to our house and the trees are at our property boundary. small. but ours. 

 

Moving Day

Ugh. We're moving. Again.

It's these sort of activities that make me wish I was some sort of Genie and could blink my eyes, wiggle my nose and be done with it. 

Hurray for our new home!

Boo for all the boxes!

the lifestyle experience - rural New Zealand.

Man, it's a little quiet up in these parts. And man that's nice. 

There's some adjustments to make, for sure. The drive is a little longer, up to an hour or a tad more. I'm getting my clothes ready for work the night before, and making pack lunches like their going out of style and my travel cup is over worked. 

On the other hand there is this

Not bad, eh? No more neighbours just a few feet away, and lots of space to breath in. I haven't seen this since the weekend because it's dark both in the morning when I leave and at night when I get back home. David assures me it's still there.

And of course there's the tennis court

No, it's not ours. But with a glass of Pimms and a sunny day on the deck we sure can pretend. 

 

And look at the SPACE! The cats are so gonna love this. As soon as they come out from underneath the bed. 

That's all I've got for now. The inside of the house is chaos. There are litter trays and blankets and toys everywhere. We've thrown our clothes all over the place to spread our scent. I'm wandering around the house like a loony lady talking to myself. We've even left the bedroom door open at night to let them find us, a previous unheard of event. Which led to a midnight back massage. And a very close inspection of my face. Who doesn't want to wake up in the middle of the night to this:

oh my god, how ARE you?!

Seriously, who'd have thought I would bump into you here? Of all places!

It's been a busy week at the homestead. Since finding tenants for our house (YAY!) and starting the arduous process of packing up our home to move (and moving stuff to the new place after work - ugh!) it has been non-stop craziness. 

Someone asked me today if I was looking for to the move, and I answered ARE YOU NUTS? Who looks forward to moving? What I am looking forward to is the week or two later when we are settled in the new place and have a lovely view of the hills, trees and tennis court (not ours, the neighbours, but we'll pretend otherwise). The ability to walk to the town centre, to the grocery store and not be able to smell the exact perfume our neighbour wears because they are at their bedroom window will be a welcome relief. 

I love our little house here in Auckland and our neighbours are, for the most part, fantastic. I mean, who can argue with neighbours you can drink with till 1 am and then roll down the driveway back home? Seriously good people. But, well, they are close. My lovely neighbour and I  joke all the time about being able to see each others' underwear choice in the morning, but David and I would like some space and air to breath. Ok, and I would like to live in a small town.

This new town has no department stores, no Starbucks (can I get an AMEN?), no movie theatre....just good old fashioned community fun. My $5 says David is bored in 5 minutes, but there is tons to do out there. It's just not city stuff, is all. 

So, if things are quiet around here for the next few days, please stay tuned. I promise to bring photos and stories of fun for all next week. We won't have interwebs at home for a while, but isn't that what work is for?

holy hell, my comfy home is now a house of horrors for children

Without wanting to a make a whole song and dance about it, we are currently trying to rent our home so that we can try living somewhere new. This is despite loving our neighbours and neighbourhood, of course, and is because we are creatures who grow moss if we stay in one spot too long. That, and we're trying to see how many address books we can get our families to buy before we settle down. Hoo-boy, is it ever driving my mother nuts.   Entertainment that money can not buy.

The other day we had a very lovely couple come and look at our home. They made all the right noises, said how lovely the home was etc. etc. 

And then they said they had a 2-yr old and 3-yr old.

All of a sudden, my home became a DEATH TRAP FOR CHILDREN. Everywhere I looked I saw hazards that made it obvious we don't have kids:

Voila! One INCINERATOR OF SMALL FINGERS.

And perfect for your little ones, one DECK-WITH-NO-RAIL OF DEATH

And wait, just when you thought there could be no more : POOL OF STAGNANT WATER FOR DROWNING                                                --->

Don't get me wrong, all the death traps are legal (the best kind of death traps!)  and only need a fireguard, railing and emptying to make it child friendly (right? TELL ME I'M RIGHT?!), but man was it ever a sharp wake up call to the changes that we would need to make should we find ourselves expecting a small guest....and I'm not talking about a gnome.

Not surprisingly, the lovely couple did not rent our home and instead chose something that would not kill their offspring more closely met their needs. And of course we're expecting another lovely, childless, couple to rent our place instead. Or, you know, one person to rent. All it takes is one. 

But now I'm thinking about our new place - with it's fancy railed deck, no pools of water and lack of fireplace  (do not get me started on the whole NO HEATING situation) - and so looking forward to a bit of a fresh start. Maybe I'm superstitious, but I can't help but think that this place is a big stagnant for me right now, that I'm holding on to the experiences of December and February and expecting the worse when I should be planning for and expecting the BEST of things to happen. Because the best does happen to fantastic people every day. 

Heck, it's a long weekend. And if that doesn't say LOTS OF SEX, well then, you're just not reading between the lines. 

house hunting ( I KNOW! A POST NOT ABOUT BABIES!!!)

It's true, I do other things that do not include obsessing over babies, pregnancy and infertility. I am truly full of talents.

David and I are on the hunt for our next property project. Because two jobs just isn't enough to keep us busy. 

This weekend we've seen about a dozen properties, none of which included a house to make you swoon. We're considering either bare land or a large bit of land with a crappy 1 or 2 bedroom house on it. We would live in the crappy house, save some cash, and then build the nice house later. 

Also, it's been raining on and off all weekend, which makes for ideal house hunting weather. Very few other house hunters are about, and you can check to see if a house has major leaking holes. 

The rain also made for some absolutely stunning views. These views are the kind that give you temporary amnesia when it comes to home sickness. These views make me want to give up city life and become a country mama.

Good, right? But no houses, right? Wait for it.....

That house is the one I want. I don't have the bazillions it would likely cost. And it's not for sale.

And that's where this blog comes in. I'm 32 cents closer to for my dream house. 32 cents! Champagne's at my place when I move in, y'all are invited.

before and after - a decorators recollection of marital harmony

So, it's Monday morning and the coffee is hot. We had a good bottle of wine last night and some loving times. The nightmare that was the hallway is now long gone. Gone, but not forgotten.

In the spirit of therapy, I thought I would share with you the event of decorating the hallway with the WALLPAPER THAT NEVER EVER EVER REPEATS, EVER.

Our hallway gets no natural light, and so since we moved in we had always kept the hallway light and white. And so, it has always looked a little like an art museum, minus the art. Especially since we filled in a door (to the left) after combining the toilet and bathroom. (Yes, my north american friends, some houses down here keep the toilet separate). 

Without further delay, the before:

 

White is good! White is clean!

After 6 hours of work, including words and phrases that would make a sailor blush, this is what we had:

it's on the wall! oh the delusion that it will stay!

It was at this point that we put any instructions given to us by the man who sold us the paper in the metaphorical garbage. Let me be clear, there is no such thing as an 'E-ZY' wallpaper paste that you can simply roll on to the wall (with such eze!) and then put the paper on top. THIS DOES NOT EXIST. You veterans of wallpaper can stop laughing at me now, thanks. 

So, we got our act together, put a plan into action, got our asses moving and ended up with this by 7pm:

still light! still bright! not entirely white! (p.s. there's textured grey paper on the right hand wall, but I'm not sure you can tell)

Bliss. There's still a little trimming to do, but for the full effect I'm really pleased. For me there is one detail that finishes the hallway off just fine, and that is these:

I adore these brushed silver light switches. And next to the silver in the wallpaper? Divine!

And so, it would not be surprising to me that I might find myself suddenly wandering my hallway, caressing the paper and making sweet eye-love to my light switches. It would be inhumane to think that we could go through so much pain and agony not to enjoy the result that much.

2 things that are not conducive to family planning

1. Wallpapering in a small space with the man you love. Only to be attempted by the truly insane, preferably on a weekend when it is sunny and warm and likely to be one of the last true hot weekends before winter hits. If you can, choose a paper that has a pattern that repeats never rarely. Then, choose the wrong glue so that the first 3 pieces fall off the wall. 6 hours later, admire the first 3 pieces that have stuck to the wall. Crack open a bottle of wine to celebrate a job half-done.

2. Financial planning at 10pm on a Sunday night. Ideally, lull your loved one into submission with wine and a good movie. Heck, go all out and make them dinner too. Wait until they are warm and snuggled on the couch, this is your chance to pounce. Start talking about ROI, business buying strategies and selling properties. Finish with a riveting read from a business book. Good times!

The romance, it's overflowing sometimes. It's a wonder it's taken us so long to conceive. Really. 

nesting

Around this time of the month I am prone to a (CRAZY) focus on getting my house just the way I want it. 

This month is no different.

Part of the drive is because I think there is a unknown psychic connection between being a 'grown-up' and having a room to put another (tiny) person and actually having a tiny person to put in the room. 

Part of it is that we're thinking of selling, and I want to get top dollar for our place (who doesn't!). (stop laughing, I KNOW what the economy is like). (No, seriously, stop laughing).

And part of it, is, well people like Puck have nice houses like this and I want one. 

Of course, people also have nasty houses like this, and I DON'T want one, thanks anyways. 

And then I start dreaming about nurseries, and it all goes down-hill from there.

I'm weak, and I know it. 

file it under g - for good gracious that looks good!

I always assumed that when I found my partner in life that they would be the one to help me 'get my act together'. I mean, my act was good - it was financially ticking over quite well and, due to many many hours in the gym, I was very happy with myself physically.I had good friends (still do!) and was pretty on track. So it may come as a surprised that I was waiting for someone else to come along to 'fix things', there didn't seem much to fix.

But what I mean is that organizationally I was a mess. I had bits of paper everywhere, documents stored at several houses due to several overseas moves and really had no idea how find a piece of required paper if it was needed. Sounds like a small thing but, oh, how it did drag me down.

When David and I met, it was a match quickly made in heaven. But he was not the answer to my organizational woes. As evidence, I present his office:

  Sweet Jesus, that's a black hole of paper.

And this is why I am now constantly working on organizing my our life. I'm a regularly at in the library 'homes' section. I scour websites, blogs, workshops and even ask friends how they organize their lives. Slowly, oh so slowly, I'm getting a handle on all our paperwork. So far, the best system I've come up with to handle bills is to banish the dreaded filing cabinet and get everything into easily accessible binders. Yup, it's like being in high-school.

So far, the book that has been most helpful is by Lissanne Oliver who wrote Sorted!: The ultimate guide to organising your life. It was this book that helped me get my piles of paper in an order that I can actually use. Her systems is simple, took about a half day, and cost me less than $20 in materials.

First, I took all the paper laying around and put it into two piles: business or home.

Then, I took each pile and started dividing between the bills. For business, I have two binders. One for bills, invoices, correspondence from the IRD and one for receipts (which I have to keep for SEVEN years. I haven't stayed in one spot for that long! EVER!).

For home, I have one for banking and credit cards, which looks full and therefore scary. This is because of the international flavour of our marriage, and the result is accounts in NZ, UK and Canada. The other binder is kept for utility bills.

The result is a very neat looking office:

 Serenity! White! Clean! Neat!

With very neat looking binders:

     oooh!   aaaah!

and very neat looking sections in those binders:

 go on, admit you're jealous.

I can now find, uber quickly, any bill or receipt. Very handy!

For now, my office is where it is. There's some shelves that I have to put up (which will get rid of that small row of books underneath my desk) and that picture frame needs to go up too. I would love to do more, but that will have to wait for another day, time, and paycheque.